THE MUDSTAINS on the Arsenal shirts told the tale of the day when 11
players from the humble Third Division became giants. For Arsenal were
not merely beaten by these men of Swindon - they were demoralised, run
into the ground, made so often to look second-class.

This was a triumph of adventure. Arsenal set out to play it
defensively with a stolid, unambitious 4-3-3 formation. That against a
side two grades below them - on paper!

Swindon, on the other hand, went for 4-2-4. And made it pay by
dominating the midfield.

I say by doing that Swindon have done not only themselves but the
whole of football the good turn for the season - perhaps for many
seasons to come. For this surely was the death knell of mere rugged
defence.

All heroes

Salute them all, these heroes from the West. But I demand an
extra-special ovation for the man who took Wembley by storm... who made
this Cup final in the mud his own triumph.

The name: DON ROGERS.

Rogers was the genius who had international defenders like Ure, McNab
and McLintock looking over their shoulders every time he had the ball.

Rogers never wasted a ball, looked always before he made his move -
and always had the Arsenal wondering where and how he was going to
strike next.

It was Rogers who scored the two extra-time goals, both deliberate,
immaculate one-man strikes, that saw Swindon home after Arsenal had
managed to pull the game out of the fire with an equaliser six minutes
from the end.

His second goal came from a great weaving run that ended in his
sidestepping the goalkeeper and bulging the net with a Bobby
Charlton-style drive. That seemed to sum it all up.

It was Rogers the master and Arsenal the mastered.

Arsenal's Jon Sammels summed it up too, when after firing in a
tremendous shot in the dying moments of the original 90 minutes, he saw
'keeper Downsborough respond with an even greater save.

Sammels sank to the ground and beat the Wembley mud with his fists in
sheer frustration. And sheer frustration represented the end of so much
of this Arsenal effort.

Swindon wouldn't get a look in, they'd told us. But it was Swindon
right from the start, fighting for every ball, calling every tune.

Well earned

When Smart put them ahead it was no more than they deserved. And this
goal highlighted Arsenal's early attitude.

Ure was so casual in turning the ball back to his advancing
goalkeeper, Wilson. All they managed to do was to set up the easiest of
chances for Smart.

And all the credit for making the goal in the first place belonged
also to that man Rogers. Calmly, he had run 50 yards with the ball,
cutting through the Arsenal defence as though it had ceased to exist.

But if Arsenal were casual early on, any sign of casualness left them
then. They realised just what they had to beat in these men of the West.
And hard though they fought, they were never equal to the task.

When they were on target, goalkeeper Downsborough was there to send
them back.

Ironically, it was Downsborough's mistake that led to Gould giving
Arsenal their extended chance six minutes from the end. He came out too
late, fumbled as Gould shot, and gave the Arsenal man a second chance to
nod that ill-deserved equaliser.

Arsenal - again a sign of desperation - had replaced successful
defender Simpson with extra striker Graham. And Swindon's midfield
director Smith came off for Penman.

The question as they went into extra time was whether Swindon could
last on this stamina-sapping pitch, on which all of them were appearing
for the first time.

Last? They hardly let Arsenal have a single kick in that 30 minutes
of extra time.

And there could have been a fourth to add to their goal total. A
drive from Trollope was sailing into the Arsenal net when it struck the
referee, and all Swindon got was a corner.

In a match in which police several times had to remove turbulent
Arsenal fans, only one player got into any trouble. Swindon's Heath had
his name taken for kicking the ball away in disgust when he thought a
throw-in was awarded the wrong way.